User blog:Pinkguy the b0ss/My opinion on the PAL SNES, N64, etc...
I know this is basically suicide, but I'm gonna say it anyways : I think that the PAL SNES, N64, etc. are inferior to the American and Japanese versions in many ways. I've been wanting to get this off my chest for more than 6 months, due to the huge amount of PAL praise and NTSC slamming on the internet, which is unavoidable when you're into retro games like me. So, let's get into this. Let's begin with the SNES. First off, the design of the console. This honestly comes down to taste. Personally, I think the PAL SNES looks alright, but not quite as good as the North American one. The North American SNES isn't the best looking Nintendo console itself, but I honestly think it looks good and not nearly as bad as some people say it is. The only thing I like better than the NTSC-UC SNES is the controller buttons, which have a single color for each one instead of the bland lavendar and purple. In the end, though, it doesn't really matter what your console looks like, as long as it works and has good games. If people hadn't brought this one-sided "argument" (I say this because public opinion is overwhelmingly in favor of the PAL SNES or SFC), then I wouldn't have even took the time to address this point. Quickly, though, are three points / things I will be critical of. First, I've recently been seeing people in the YouTube comments or other places saying, "Oh, the European one is good and the U.S. one is bad because the PAL one is how it was MEANT to look." Now, before I address the utter stupidity of this argument, I'll say this : I have nothing against anyone who agrees with this statement, they're entitled to their opinion as I am. But someone needs to tell me why just because the original Japanese Super Famicom looks identical to your precious European SNES, that instantly makes it "how it was meant to look," and therefore, invalidates the U.S. console's design? Sure, it was how it was meant to look. For your region. Same goes for the U.S. one, that's how it was meant to look for North America. You can't say the U.S. one is not a way that the SNES was supposed to look just because you hate its design, then call the European one the objective way the SNES was supposed to look just because you think it looks better. That's not how it works. The second argument I'll address is how a lot of people say others prefer the U.S. SNES only because they grew up with it, and that their judgement is based purely on nostalgia.... while literally going on nostalgia-fueled rants as to why they think their dear PAL SNES looks so much better. Newsflash : just because you're nostalgic for something doesn't make it automatically better than other things. Sure, some of the people who prefer the U.S. SNES may do so out of nostalgia, but so do some of those many more people who prefer the European one. The last thing I'll briefly talk about is a request from many people to Nintendo - they literally wanted Nintendo's SNES Classic Edition to use the European design, even in the U.S. Whenever I see someone say this in the comments, I roll my eyes. Sorry buddy, but Nintendo isn't going to cater to your special needs just because you like the European design better. That's not how marketing works. They're going to use the design that everyone here in North America is familiar with - you know, Ol' Blocky. If they had used the European design, it wouldn't have sold nearly as much as it did, since most people wouldn't even recognize what it was, and would likely think it's a bootleg. ... Phew, I think I'm calmed down now. Anyways, now to talk about the console's performance. The framerate of PAL SNES games is somewhat slower, in addition to loading times. NTSC runs at a maximum of 30 FPS, which anytime slowdown happens is annoying enough, but with a lower max framerate (25 FPS) for PAL, the slowdown is worse. I'll address this point later when I talk about the N64. One thing that is slightly better with PAL is the resolution, having a 576i resolution, vs NTSC, which has a 480i resolution. Basically, the design doesn't really matter all that much. The performance, however, is why I believe the versions of the games for the NTSC-UC SNES, and even the Super Famicom, are better than the PAL SNES versions that everyone seems to worship. I don't know why, there's so much of this on the internet, maybe it's because Google just gives me results from the UK and Europe despite the fact I live in the US. The same thing basically goes for the Nintendo 64. For this one, I can't comment on the design because... it literally has the same design worldwide, with the consoles from different regions being indistinguishable on a first glance. The only way to tell them apart is framerate and resolution. Now, for the console's performance. It's obviously not as good as the US or Japanese N64, being 5 FPS less. However, the resolution is a bit better. This is mostly noticeable on an emulator, with the NTSC versions having small black bars on the bottom and top, and PAL taking up the whole window. I played Super Mario 64 for comparison's sake, and to be honest, the PAL version isn't nearly as terrible as I made it out to be from pre-judging. I obviously still prefer the NTSC version over it due to the slightly better performance, though. As for consoles after this... the whole 50hz vs 60hz thing was basically resolved, with PAL games now running at the correct speed. Eventually, digital TVs became the norm, and two new TV standards replaced NTSC and PAL respectively - ATSC and DVB, now with the two basically being indistinguishable, so really, this whole NTSC vs PAL thing is kind of irrelevant in modern consoles, especially given that region locking is seen as an outdated concept and all the three major consoles - Nintendo Switch, Playstation 4, and XBOX One - have no restrictions. So yeah, I just wanted to get all that crap off of my chest. I wouldn't have made this post if Google didn't give me so many search results from the UK or Europe. I don't have anything against you if you prefer PAL for whatever reason, just know that my mind won't be changing. Thanks for reading. Category:Blog posts